Wade4Wireless

Trains Private Wireless Use Cases


When looking at trains we have to understand that communication gear on the train has to be rugged and acceptable for train use. I would research EN50155 which is a railway standard for certain criteria for environmental, shock, vibration, power supply, EMC, power surge, ESD and other factors in travel. 

The standard may be a problem with your equipment provider (OEM) because if they don’t meet the standard then you may not have the proper solution. 

Back when I put WiMAX on trains, we had worked with a company called RuggedCom who specialized on one off solutions. Unfortunately WiMAX is no more. RuggedCom was bought by Siemens bought RuggedCom back in 2012.

  1. Local private networks on the train itself should be more important than they are. I can’t believe how train transportation can do so many things well but the communications relies not outside poles and network outside of the train itself. I just think having a secure network that isn’t Wi-Fi would be the best way for the workers to communicate, upload schedules and alarms, and protect data. 
  2. Broadband on trains is already a thing. There are several ways they do this but the most common way I know of is to use a carrier’s router, probably with 4G today but it will migrate to 5G no later than 2030. I am not sure a private network would serve them here unless they want to build a secure network alongside the tracks. While whomever sells the system would be so happy for the large network, I don’t think it would be a thing.
  3. Video on the train could be handled via private networks but today they use Wi-Fi or wire to connect the video cameras. I think video is critical but just so you know, they have alternate solutions for this. They will put it in, set it, and forget it until they notice the camera isn’t working.
  4. Self driving control is another thing but again hey rely on the carriers to perform this connection. It makes sense when you think of the large areas they cover.
  5. Car to car communication is one thing that I think makes the most sense. It would be secure and solid without the wires. 
  6. Safety would be a key thing. I have worked on several safety proposals for tracking people and each time when we got to the end they said they would not do it because it was too political. I don’t know what that means but after months of building the solution and proposal, it was shot down. More than once. However, let me share the idea. Our idea is to have live tracking or workers inside the cars and outside. We would have to use a local private network in conjunction with a carrier’s network, LoRa, GPS, and tagging of workers. The idea was to alert workers if a train was coming and alert the train’s crew if there were workers ahead. It would have to be an early alert system because it takes roughly a mile to stop a train. 
  7. Logistics is a key use case that makes a lot of sense. While you could use BLE or RFID or even scan packages, I think on a train you just want to track a pallet or box as it comes onto the train and see it moving from point A to point B in real time. Today they log it going onto the train and coming off the train. Maybe that’s all you need. We were going to build a model using LoRa or PLTE as a way to connect the LoRa gateways and they could connect to the RFID or BLE units. While this seems to be heavy, it worked. 

One thing to remember about railways in the US, it is very hard to break in yourself. If you have partners who do work for the railroad today, partner with them. When I worked with them in the past, it was difficult to do anything. The priorities they have are a bit different. 

On one project we came up with a safety solution. We put the pre-sales work in only to have them tell us it was too political to implement at that time. We gave them our design and that’s their rejection, it’s too political. What does that even mean? No explanation. 

On another project we came up with a connectivity solution for the train using 4G. This was an RFP so it was on a level playing field. However, they pulled back the RFP because at the time there were other pressing issues. Again, what does that mean?Just because I haven’t had any luck doesn’t mean you won’t. Back when WiMax was being deployed, we sold quite a few units to railroads. We did it through a partner who had a relationship with them. So it makes sense to partner with someone who already knows how the railroad works politically.

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